By Adam Cohen, New York Times (via Truthout)
It’s been almost eight years since that FUBAR election in 2000, but still our voting rights are not protected. In fact, the Supreme Court of the United States recently upheld an Indiana voter ID law, which will disenfranchise many voters.
It would be hard for Florida to surpass its disastrous performance in the 2000 election, but give the Sunshine State credit for trying. Its latest assault on democracy: a law threatening volunteer groups with crippling fines if they make small mistakes in registering voters. The law seems clearly aimed at keeping new voters - especially minorities and the poor - off the rolls. And it is working. The League of Women Voters, which has registered Florida voters since 1939, has
called off its registration drive this year.
Florida is not the only state trying to stop eligible people from voting. Georgia passed a law in 2005 that made voters pay for their voter ID cards - a modern poll tax. The fee was eventually removed, but the law could still block as many as 300,000 registered voters without the right ID from casting ballots. In 2004, Ohio ordered counties to throw out voter registration forms that were not on thick enough paper.
It is chilling to think that state legislators and election officials would intentionally try to make it harder for Americans to vote, but they always have - with poll taxes, literacy tests and gerrymandering. There was a time when the Supreme Court regularly struck these restrictions down. In 1966, it held Virginia’s $1.50 poll tax unconstitutional. In 1972, it ruled that Tennessee’s one-year residency requirement for voting violated the Constitution.
Now the Supreme Court has switched sides. This week, it upheld a harsh Indiana voter ID law that could disenfranchise many poor, elderly and student voters. The ruling will make it even easier for other states to block voters’ access to the ballot box.
If the courts won’t protect voters, Congress has to. The Constitution, in Article 1, Section 4, gives Congress broad authority to set the rules for federal elections. It should use this power to set minimum voting rights standards that would apply nationwide and ensure that all eligible Americans could vote.
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